Not sure if I should post this here or in http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php?topic=7767.0

But this is a busy thread, so I'll post it here. If incorrect, mods please move. Thanks.

 

Cincinnati Considers Options For Decades-Old Unfinished Subway

 

POSTED: 11:30 am EST December 6, 2007

 

CINCINNATI -- It's almost a riddle: When does a city spend $2.6 million to maintain a subway tunnel system that's never been used?

 

The answer is: When just filling the tunnels in will cost $19 million.

 

From time to time, city officials ponder what to do with the abandoned, unfinished subway tunnels that start downtown and go north for 2.2 miles.

 

A new study, the most comprehensive analysis of the subway in decades, recommends making some repairs and maintaining the side-by-side tunnels at a cost of $2.6 million over the next five years -- a much cheaper option than reviving the subway for modern transit cars.

 

City engineers said in the study that it would cost about $100.5 million to make the tunnels usable for modern transit.

 

Just filling in the tunnels would cost about $19.6 million.

 

Either way, the city would have to spend another $14 million to relocate a 52-inch water main placed in the southbound tunnel in the 1950s, and that could require a regionwide water rate increase.

 

"We can't just continue to pour money into these," said Martha Kelly, a principal engineer for Cincinnati. "The subway is nearing the end of its 100-year design life. So we do need to make a decision on the future of rapid transit."

 

The tunnels are made of 100 concrete sections that were cast in place when the subway was built in the 1920s. Those sections are still in fair shape, but some of the joints between them have deteriorated.

 

"It didn't go anywhere, but it was built well," said Councilman Chris Bortz, chairman of the Economic Development Committee, which received the engineers' report.

 

In 1916, residents approved a $6.1 million bond issue to build a subway along the former route of the Miami and Erie Canal. But World War I intervened, and the project was abandoned in 1927 when the money ran out.

 

Pavement was laid over the tunnels, creating downtown's Central Parkway, and the concept of mass transit gave way to expressways.

 

As recently as 2002, voters rejected a half-cent sales tax plan that would have incorporated the tunnels into a $2.6 billion regional light rail plan parallel to Interstate 75.

 

But even the $114 million total cost of upgrading the tunnels and moving the water main wouldn't include the subway cars or other costs, such as tracks, utilities, ventilation systems and at least three new stations at a cost of $4.5 million each.

 

The engineers' report didn't take a position on the question of whether the region needs a mass transit system but recommended more study on how to get some use from the tunnels.

 

Although the $2.6 million in repairs will have to come from money already allocated for street repairs, housing and other needs, Bortz said it was a "no brainer" to protect the city's investment.

 

"Here we go again with these incredible assets that are lying fallow," Bortz said. "We keep recognizing its potential, and maybe we're getting closer to grabbing that potential."

 

http://www.wlwt.com/news/14790068/detail.html

If ignorance is bliss, here's the happiest guy in Cincinnati.  Somebody please write a letter in response:

 

Adding lanes to secondary roads best transit solution

Cincinnati Enquirer / Letter to the Editor

 

I am tired of hearing about these high-priced dreams of improving access to the city/Metro area via light rail, streetcars, etc. Why don't we follow other cities and just add one or two lanes on some of the state routes to downtown? Better traffic signaling and traffic direction changes for lanes depending on the time of day will obviously be needed. These are secondary roads that should be used by local residents to travel to downtown or intermediate areas.

 

Click on link for article.

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080102/EDIT0202/801020303/1022/rss

^sigh^

Am I speaking for myself when I say we don't want more cars downtown?

OK if we add extra lanes to secondary roads how does that help anyone get from the ballpark up to Cadilac or McFaddens or Fountain Square? Once in the car after a baseball game its just as easy to go to Kenwood as Fountain square. Maybe easier.

But I'm preaching to the choir here, I know.

 

I just sent a letter, thanks for the link.

If ignorance is bliss, here's the happiest guy in Cincinnati.  Somebody please write a letter in response:

 

Adding lanes to secondary roads best transit solution

Cincinnati Enquirer / Letter to the Editor

 

I am tired of hearing about these high-priced dreams of improving access to the city/Metro area via light rail, streetcars, etc. Why don't we follow other cities and just add one or two lanes on some of the state routes to downtown? Better traffic signaling and traffic direction changes for lanes depending on the time of day will obviously be needed. These are secondary roads that should be used by local residents to travel to downtown or intermediate areas.

 

Removed rest of letter - xumelanie

 

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080102/EDIT0202/801020303/1022/rss

 

If I wanted to get back into school mode, I would go look up my notes on added lanes - but I believe the most recent study on this says that congestion would be equal on the new roadway within 5 yrs.  At the cost, (economic, social and environmental) of new road construction, that is insane.  You would have to build a new lane each way every 5 years to keep pace.  .....or you could start a decent multimodal public transportation system and simply increase service frequency to meet demand. 

Not to mention, it also costs a lot of money to add lanes. Even if the state is paying for it.

and the state highway fund and the federal highway fund are both projected to go into the red in the next few years.  I can't imagine a politician will try to raise gas taxes with $100 barrel oil

^...and if taxes are raised, combined with the inevitable increase in energy cost, the masses will be begging for these street cars, light rail and commuter rail. But hey, what do we know.

Doesn't the state pay for the upgrade and maintenance of these state routes?

 

I guess the state grows money on trees, and his SUV runs on the sun shining out of his ass.

^sigh^

Am I speaking for myself when I say we don't want more cars downtown?

OK if we add extra lanes to secondary roads how does that help anyone get from the ballpark up to Cadilac or McFaddens of Fountain Square? Once in the car after a baseball game its just as easy to go to Kenwood as Fountain square. Maybe easier.

But I'm preaching to the choir here, I know.

 

I just sent a letter, thanks for the link.

 

No, you're right.  The problem is that most people don't even consider living "in" the city.  I honestly don't think it even enters their minds when they read a story about the streetcar or light rail in the Enquirer.  They come strictly from a suburban mindset that can't fathom anyone actually residing downtown; only commuting in and out of it every day.  This type of criticism won't disappear until the streetcar is actually built and people can see what it really does.  Of course, it may not vanish even then, but at least at that point we'll have some rail in this city, and hopefully more on the way.

I posted this at the Cleveland RTA thread, but I thought you folks down south might find this interesting too. I wrote this article last May and which was published in the Midwest High Speed Rail Association newsletter....

_____________________

 

 

The Plot to Derail Rail’s Revival

New federal criteria is denying rail funding – on purpose

By Ken Prendergast

 

With 25 years of rail’s popularity and success – including for light-rail, regional commuter rail and intercity passenger trains – you’d think the federal government would be eager to meet their electorate’s desires.

 

Instead, the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) and other federal transportation agencies have made a concerted effort to change project-scoring criteria to deny funding to rail projects and make it appear there is actually less demand for new rail projects. The end result is what they desired – divert federal dollars to new high-occupancy vehicle lanes on freeways and bus alternatives that have little hope of encouraging denser, mixed-use developments around transit stops.

 

The obvious question is – why?

 

The disturbing answer is reminiscent of a dark chapter in America’s transportation history book in which highway and oil industries joined forces to create shell companies to buy electric streetcar systems and replace them with buses. Today, the highway lobby is using a slightly different tactic to stop the transit renaissance dead in its tracks. It’s a tactic that gained traction in the last six years with the White House and Congressional leaders.

 

The transit renaissance, and rail’s energizing of it, is hard to ignore. In March, the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) reported that Americans took 10.1 billion trips on local transit in 2006. It was the first time in 50 years that public transit was used so heavily. The ridership growth didn’t just start when gas prices began heading upward in 2004.

 

“Public transit use is up 30 percent since 1995,” APTA reported. “That is more than double the growth rate of the (nation’s) population (12 percent) and higher than the growth rate for the vehicle miles traveled on our roads (24 percent) during that same period.”

 

Rail transit ridership was responsible for the nation’s increased use of public transportation, according to an analysis by Ed Tennyson, Pennsylvania’s former deputy secretary of transportation, now a consultant to the nonprofit organization Light Rail Now!

 

“If we analyze the APTA data, ridership went down with streetcar eliminations from 1956 to 1981 when San Diego Trolley came alive,” Tennyson wrote. “Ridership had gone down 75 percent as (the nation’s) population grew. Transit was no longer relevant except in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, Pittsburgh, San Francisco and New Oreleans. Why there? Rail service. Even Shaker Heights, with Cleveland’s partial demise, lost only half as many riders as bus systems did.

 

“Now, since 1984, what has happened?” Tennyson asked. “Using APTA-FTA data, light rail has grown 274 percent from a small base. Regional commuter rail has grown 57 percent from a larger base. Rapid rail (subways, elevated railways, etc.) has grown 40-some percent from a large base and buses lost half a percent from the largest base.”

 

New rail transit services continue to be added while existing services are expanded. Yet, many of these are happening with federal funding contributions reduced from 80 percent of total project costs in the 1980s to less than 50 percent today. Smaller, new-start rail transit projects – Denver’s Central Corridor, St. Louis’ Cross-County light-rail line, the first phase of New Mexico’s RailRunner – are getting built with no federal dollars.

 

The total number of new-start transit projects receiving federal funding fell from 80 projects in 2002 to 40 in 2006, according to the New Starts Working Group. Most new-start projects are rail. The declining federal contribution is a big factor, especially for conducting preliminary engineering. Another factor is the increasingly complicated planning process which the FTA puts a project through. In the past, it would typically take five years for a project to go from the alternatives analysis phase to final design. Today, the planning process takes at least 10 years, said Jeff Boothe, chairman of the New Starts Working Group and a partner at the Washington D.C. office of Holland & Knight, LLP.

 

“They (FTA) are putting more of the onus on local funding for design with less certainty for federal funding,” he said. “People are spending a lot more time, which is money, before you get considered for a full funding grant agreement (from the FTA). There aren’t many transit agencies willing to going through that. It’s death by a thousand cuts.”

 

As is typically the case for any transportation mode, there are far more transit projects than there is federal funding available to them. For transit, however, there is a 20-year backlog of projects waiting for federal funding. Last year, the FTA New Starts Program was funded at just $1.2 billion.

 

Furthermore, in 2002 the FTA began changing the weighting, or emphasis on criteria it uses to rate new-start transit projects in search of federal funding. Cost, ridership, benefits to low-income areas and environmental impacts are among the key factors FTA uses to measure the merits of a New Start project. Cost-effectiveness is now a primary factor, determined by travel time savings and annualized capital costs over the short term. Land-use impacts were pushed farther down the list.

 

Although rail projects tend to have large, up-front construction costs, they have more long-term benefits than buses by encouraging denser, mixed-used communities around transit stops. The reason is rail’s permanence provides confidence to real estate developers; they know that rail will serve their investments for decades. Rail services also have more easily identifiable routes and carry less of a social stigma than buses. Rail competes well with express buses on travel time savings when higher-density neighborhoods exist around stations.

 

But when land-use impacts carry less weight with the FTA than short-term cost-effectiveness, the FTA will opt for high-occupancy vehicle highway lanes in low-density, suburban sprawl areas and a few Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) routes.

 

“It (the New Starts standards) totally misses how you reshape a city,” said Kevin McCarty, senior director of federal policy at the Surface Transportation Policy Project.

 

“There are no cost-effective rail projects anymore,” Boothe said. “The focus is on BRT and to use FTA money on HOV lanes and put in express buses. Then they turn the HOV lane over to single-occupant cars. The New Starts Program has become a highway program.”

 

“They (FTA) seem to be more highway oriented,” McCarty said. “If you make the whole (project rating) thing about travel-time reduction, then the truth is that for a lot of (rail) segments, it isn’t going to be enough. On a given rail corridor, up to 30 percent are taking transit. That’s a lot of lane capacity, saving (drivers’) travel time.”

 

So how did the FTA come to hold new rail projects in such a low regard? Like everything else in Washington D.C., nothing happens without political pressure. That pressure was applied by a succession of congressmen who chaired the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation, which has spending authority over U.S. Department of Transportation programs. First was Harold “Hal” Rogers (Kentucky’s 5th District). Next was Ernest Istook Jr. (Oklahoma’s 5th District). Most recently, it was Joe Knollenberg (Michigan’s 9th District).

 

“They put the pressure on OMB (Office of Management and Budget) and OMB puts pressure on the FTA,” Boothe said.

 

And who put the pressure on Congressmen Rogers, Istook and Knollenberg? Highway and oil lobbyists are funneling their message, and money, through so-called independent “think tanks” espousing far-right causes. They include the Reason Foundation, Thoreau Institute, Coors Foundation, Buckeye Policy Institute and others.

 

Among their funders, according to Media Transparency and compiled by Light Rail Now!, are the Sarah Mellon Scaife Foundation, Charles G. Koch Foundation, David H. Koch Charitable Foundation, Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation, plus The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation. Founders of these “charitable groups” grew their fortunes from oil, pipelines and asphalt, Media Transparency reports. And, they gave more than $50 million to right-wing “think tanks” seeking to block rail transit and smart growth.

 

“They are in complicity with the committee chairs, the FTA and OMB,” Boothe said. “We have a lot of ideology working here. They view that road and air (travel) is the free market. Rail is viewed as social engineering. It’s frustrating and ludicrous.”

 

At a 2004 hearing of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation, then-Chairman Istook opened the session by saying that while he comprehends the nation’s need for more transit services, “we need to distinguish between the grass and the weeds.”

 

“It’s all an effort to move away from rail and it extends to high-speed rail, too,” said Boothe, a Washington D.C. political insider for 25 years. “It’s history repeating itself. They’re trying to kill off rail transit again.”

 

He referred to National City Lines, the most prominent of many shell corporations created in the 1930s by General Motors, Standard Oil, Firestone Tire, Phillips Petroleum, Mack Truck (which made buses) to acquire electric streetcar and interurban railway systems. Back then, most transit systems were run by private companies which competed against government-owned roads. Transit companies were wracked by the Great Depression and a Supreme Court ruling that divorced their railway and electric utility operations on the grounds they wielded too much political power and ignored rural interests. More than 40 transit systems were acquired by National City Lines, their streetcars dismantled and replaced with buses made by GM and Mack, burning Standard Oil and Phillips fuel and running on Firestone tires.

 

In 1949, the U.S. Justice Department prosecuted National City Lines and its corporate financiers on antitrust conspiracy charges, winning at the district and appellate court levels. The U.S. Supreme Court overturned the lower courts’ rulings.

 

“Street railways failed for economic and demographic reasons which had nothing to do with any plot by General Motors,” GM officials countered.

 

The transit renaissance in recent decades, riding on the rebirth of rail, has become a threat to the highway and oil lobbies’ monopoly power over how we have lived and traveled for the past 50 years.

 

Boothe said there is hope in Congressman James Oberstar of Minnesota, a strong supporter of rail transit who took over this year as chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation. Oberstar said he will hold oversight hearings in the coming months on the FTA’s scoring criteria for New Starts.

 

“I’m optimistic we’ll get an airing of these (New Starts) issues,” Boothe said. “I hope that FTA realizes there’s a new sheriff in town.”

 

END

___________________________

 

The Plot, In a Nutshell...

 

Full Speed Ahead – Since 1995, ridership on public transit has risen 30 percent, faster than the nation’s population growth, and even faster than the rising use of cars. According to transit industry data, all of public transit’s ridership growth is the result of the greater availability of rail transit and its encouragement of smart growth around stations.

 

Not so Fast – At the same time, the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) has made it more difficult for transit agencies and communities to submit federal funding requests for rail projects and get them approved. Instead, bus rapid transit and high-occupancy vehicle lanes on highways are getting an increasing share of the federal funding. It is an apparent attempt to make it seem as if there is less demand for rail projects.

 

The Train Robbers – The FTA is under pressure from the Office of Management and Budget, which in turn was under pressure from the last three chairmen of the U.S. House of Representatives’ Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation. Those three chairmen saw eye-to-eye with right-wing “think thanks,” funding by highway and oil interests, who consider rail to be social engineering and highways/aviation part of the free market.

 

New Sheriff in Town – There is a new chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation, James Oberstar, who is very pro-rail, and will hold hearings on FTA’s anti-rail bias.

 

END

___________________________

 

 

Why care?

 

Why should advocates of intercity passenger trains care what happens to local transit systems? The reasons are numerous:

 

There is a synergistic relationship between real estate development patterns and different modes of transportation. Higher-density, mixed-use communities nourish, and are nourished by higher-density modes like rail transit and intercity rail; Low-density, sprawling communities encourage, if not require people to drive for virtually every trip, be they across the street or across the state;

 

There is also a synergistic relationship between the usage of intercity passenger trains and local transit systems. Where the modes are conveniently linked at shared station facilities, with coordinated schedules and clear information, ridership on both modes tends to increase. When people have to get in their cars to reach the train station, they are more likely to keep on driving.

 

Federal investments in local transit can benefit intercity passenger train service quality. For example, regional commuter rail services often share rights of way and stations with intercity passenger trains, so a federal investment in commuter rail can speed up intercity trains, improve their safety and reliability, and provide their riders with more comfortable station facilities. Even where there is no commuter rail service, federal funding has created intermodal transportation centers uniting light-rail, and/or local/intercity buses with intercity rail.

 

In some cases, it’s difficult to tell the difference between a commuter and an intercity rail travel corridor. The FTA considers a travel market 135 miles or less and having at least several thousand weekday travelers bound for one or more cities along the corridor to be a commuter market. The start-up of Amtrak’s Boston-Portland Downeaster service was funded in this manner. Eligible Midwest corridors could include Chicago-Milwaukee, Chicago-Champaign/Urbana, Cleveland-Youngstown-Pittsburgh, Cincinnati-Dayton-Columbus and others;

 

The anti-rail transit attitude in recent years in Washington D.C. has extended to intercity passenger rail, creating a negative policy climate for Amtrak and high-speed rail funding.

 

END

^ Great article, but why do you term those groups as "right-wing think tanks"?  Isn't the Reason Foundation tied to the Libertarian Party, which stands for one's right to do pretty much anything that doesn't impinge on someone else's rights?  I mean, they support the legalization of everything from marijuana to cocaine to gambling to prostitution.  You don't get much more left wing than that.  Not trying to quibble, and I'm certainly off topic, but I tend to think that rail's enemies share ignorance and/or greed, more than political affiliation.

Thanks for the compliment on the article. But Libertarian groups are, first and foremost, anti-government in just about all circumstances. Thus the reason why they want illegal drugs legalized are very different from why left-wing groups want them legalized.

 

Many in the oil and highway lobbies don't support libertarian groups becasue they agree with all of their politics. They do share an anti-rail, smart-growth position and libertarian groups are all too happy to take the oil/highway lobbies' money. And, until very recently, libertarian groups were silent on government ownership and control of highways, making them hypocritical. When rail supporters called them on that discrepancy, they began to make noise about a newfound desire to sell or lease some highways to private owners. But many libertarians still believe roads and highways are a public good (even though communist China is building a highway system that will be operated by private enterprise). I haven't made up my mind on this issue, but I find the discrepancy fascinating.

 

Back to the Cincinnati streetcar.....

Yes...Libertarians are as far right as it goes.

Here are some recent shots of the CL&N Tunnel in Walnut Hills.  This tunnel is brought up from time to time, but it is too narrow for double-tracking.  It was originally double-tracked narrow gauge, then suicide tracked (a rare overlapping double-tracking that avoided installing switches at each portal) for standard gauge, until there was a collision at some point around 1920.  I hadn't been in it in a few years and nothing's changed, however, DO NOT go down there when it's too cold, the entrances fill with ice and it's pretty dangerous.  Don't say I didn't warn you. 

 

 

Same spot, opposite direction:

 

One thing I've come to notice about tunnel photographs is that it's tough to get a sense of their height and length.  My stuff laying around might help give some perspective:

 

 

I'm looking to maybe get some pics of the subway tunnels.. what is the easiest and least conspicuous way to get down there?

>I'm looking to maybe get some pics of the subway tunnels.. what is the easiest and least conspicuous way to get down there?

 

Don't go down there unannounced, the place is wired now.  I had been down there about 7 times over the past 10 years with no problems but was recently apprehended not by the police but by a representative of the SWAT team.  I was lucky to avoid getting a trespassing citation. 

>I'm looking to maybe get some pics of the subway tunnels.. what is the easiest and least conspicuous way to get down there?

 

Don't go down there unannounced, the place is wired now.  I had been down there about 7 times over the past 10 years with no problems but was recently apprehended not by the police but by a representative of the SWAT team.  I was lucky to avoid getting a trespassing citation. 

 

So.... how would one get down there then without getting cited... and why is it wired now.. hmmmm.

You haven't been able to get into the big tunnel illegally without tools since 2005 when the portal doors were replaced and the foliage between the portals and I-75 were trimmed back, making any attempts to climb over the door or remove vents with a hacksaw visible to hundreds of people a minute.  The Hopple St. tunnel portals are still open but are now visible by Artimis cameras, especially during the winter. 

Before Sept 11th your mom could climb over the steel door into the broken fence part easily. The watermain is the reason for the tightened security. It's funny people actually pay $ to go down there, but the times have changed and if you haven't been down there before,  try and get on a tour if they even have them anymore..?

>Before Sept 11th your mom could climb over the steel door into the broken fence part easily. The watermain is the reason for the tightened security. It's funny people actually pay $ to go down there, but the times have changed and if you haven't been down there before,  try and get on a tour if they even have them anymore..?

 

 

The museum center just announced another tour, I think on April 12.  They have brochures at Union Terminal.  However, they are now not allowing cameras.  My source tells me the reason is the water main, which has been identified as a possible terror target.  And in fact "civilians" are apparently not allowed in the subway at any time when the water main is active because it could theoretically burst and drown anyone down there. 

 

Also, the portal doors were open today and a crew was installing replacement sections to the water main. 

WTF

 

Well, then its completely useless. Screw that. I've seen the insides, and it's pretty damn boring if you ask me.

^ Thats what I was just going to say. There is no point in going if you can't take pictures.

Here's a rebuttal of a recent LA Times guest editorial that was written by two well-known opponents of rail transit. I know nothing about its author, but it's reasonable and emblematic of the debate swirling around public transportation all over the United States today. It's counterintuitive, so be prepared to think outside the box.

 

John Schneider

 

[Article follows]

 

"This past Sunday, the L.A. Times featured an op-ed titled "The MTA's Train Wreck" by James Moore and Tom Rubin, which made the claim that Metro has made a major mistake by investing in rail instead of buses.  Both Mr. Moore and Mr. Rubin are well-known transit experts and longtime rail critics.  I'm a lowly blogger.  So why is it that I disagree with their assertion that Metro is making a mistake by investing in rail transit?

 

The gist of the opinion piece is that transit ridership has fallen even though Metro has invested over $11 billion on rail in the last 20 years.  The authors imply that if expensive rail projects were scrapped and the savings were applied to add more bus service and lower the fares, transit ridership would increase.  To be honest, I don't disagree with this conclusion.  However, I also don't think it would solve any of the transportation problems our region faces.

 

I think rail, more than anything else, has the potential to reorient the city and solve its most notorious problems, most of which stem from what many would consider its No. 1 problem, traffic.

 

Click on link for article.

 

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/emeraldcity/2008/01/buses-trains-an.html

 

hmmmmmmm......

if this doesn't persuade the people against light rail and better public transportation to join our fight, nothing will. 

 

http://news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080301/BIZ/803010340/-1/CINCI

 

Gas could hit 4 a gallon by spring...

if this doesn't persuade the people against light rail and better public transportation to join our fight, nothing will. 

 

http://news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080301/BIZ/803010340/-1/CINCI

 

Gas could hit 4 a gallon by spring...

 

Read the Peak Oil thread. $3 and $4 gas will be pleasant memories in 5-10 years.

From Paul Daugherty's Blog

 

Sad Story Only I Care About

 

...

 

This is my hometown, only where I grew up, Bethesda, Md., is barely recognizable now. I can go home again, though. It's 20 minutes from my downtown hotel, by light rail. The Metro system here is fabulous.

 

Those who oppose light rail I'm guessing haven't used it much. It cost me $2 to get from the airport to downtown, probably a 15-minute car ride, plus outrageous parking costs. Taxi? Probably $25. I've ridden light rail in every big city in America. Nowhere is it anything but cheap and (mostly) convenient.

 

Click on link for article.

 

Reader comments at http://frontier.cincinnati.com/blogs/daugherty/

Wonder of Daugherty knows you can take TANK to the airport from downtown Cincinnati for cheap. 

 

Unfortunately our aiport situation here is more complicated than most because of the Dayton factor.  Dayton's bus system doesn't have service to their airport.  And with only 3 Greyhounds per day to Dayton from Cincinnati, getting to Dayton's airport from Cincinnati is impossible without taking a cab from the Dayton Greyhound station and the 3 buses per day restrict what flights you can take.  And unfortunately a lot of people fly out of there, even business travelers.  Last week I flew on the company's tab out of Dayton to Atlanta on 24-hour notice for $600 but from Cincinnati it was $2200.   

 

 

I think some people who troll forums and newsgroups are editorial journalists who are seeking points they didn't think of or are even trying to get others to basically write columns for them.

Wonder of Daugherty knows you can take TANK to the airport from downtown Cincinnati for cheap. 

 

It goes back to the same argument... people who DON'T ride buses DO ride light rail.  It's true!

 

By the way, I was listening to sports talk tonight on WLW and Daugherty called in and repeated this sentiment.

This is one of the things that makes me want to smash my head in David Letterman's 80-ton press.  It's the differences between streetcar, light rail, and heavy rail.  I can state with certainty that Washington, DC has heavy rail.  It's a true, 100%, grade-separated rail line; it's a schizophrenic subway that doesn't know that subways should be underground.  In the burbs is goes above ground, but maintains its grade separation religiously. 

 

I'm biased, but I really like Germany's separation of various types of rail service. Strassenbahn = streetcar; it is often grade-separated except where it's not practical/possible--often in the city center.  U-Bahn (subway)...should be clear to most.  S-Bahn (S = schnell, which means "fast" rail)...this is like commuter rail that goes both directions throughout the day.  Regionalbahn would be like service between Cincinnati, Fairfield, Hamilton, and Oxford (another biased point of view).  Intercity (ICE - Inter City Express) would be Cincy --> Dayton --> Columbus --> Cleveland

^Agreed with the whole Germany set-up...however to the average joe they see rail and apply whatever buzz word they have been hearing lately for it.  Whether it be lightrail, streetcar, elevated rail, subway, etc.  The good sign here is that when someone warms up to one of them...they seem to warm up to the idea of all the different modes.

I don't know what you want to call DC's rail system, all I know is that it works!  I lived there for about a year and didn't own a car.  The rail system was absolutely fabulous!  No need for a car.  While it's true the "subway" does travel above ground quite a bit, it is perfectly functional doing so, and the system is the easiest to get around out of any that I have been on.

^ We just call it Metro.  ;)  It's a great system that's underfunded and sadly in disrepair right now.  Delays abound especially on the oldest line (red), and the orange line cars are so packed it's driving people back to their cars (pun intended).  If Cincinnati had a viable carless option, I'd seriously consider moving back. 

 

 

^You should write a letter to the editor, or email/write the members of City Council about just that.  I think many people don't fully understand the significance of having a rail transit system.

^ Check out this month's issue of RAIL. It has a great piece on the Metro and why the system was so underfunded for years. The maintenance headaches have caught up to Metro and they are embarking on a program that will eventually replace the trains with modern replacements, and catch up on 10-15 years of deferred work.

^ the first problem with Metro is that it serves three competing jurisdictions, so it's tough for anything to get done at the highest levels.  It kills me that northern Kentucky (well, Newport at least) would be a willing, eager partner with Cincinnati, yet nothing is happening because one jurisdiction can't get it together.  I like that progress is being made, but it's frustratingly slow.  And I don't even live there.  :)

 

I also have this fantasy that will never come true.  When I fly to CVG to visit friends and family I'd like to not have to rent a car. 

 

I'll definitely write in to the Enquirer.  Does anybody know if pen-and-paper letters have a greater probability of being published? 

from my experience, no.

^^It is better to do pen/paper letters to politicians though.  The Enquirer shouldn't matter either way.

Unfortunately, the DC story does point out the challenges in developing a true regional transit system. We don't have the feds who funded it in the first place and don't really want to pay up, but nonetheless we have two/three states along with numerous smaller gov'ts and all that means that it will take massive effort and constitutional amendments to get decent, reliable funding for a quality regional system.

BART was formed and started construction with no federal funding whatsoever.  The system did receive federal funding after the Washington Metro fired up, however.  There was at least one instance in the late 70's where Metro was nearly killed, even after the red line and part of the orange/blue line had begun operation.  Obviously very difficult geography dictated the need for big-time rail in San Francisco but it didn't appear at the same time as the early east coast systems because the city was physically small and well-served by its streetcar system (which included a few tunnels) and the technology and need didn't quite exist for the transbay tunnel.  San Francisco is still served by its streetcar/light rail system (Muni) and then BART is like the Washington Metro in that it functions somewhat like commuter rail. 

 

MARTA suffers from similar funding problems and the downtown subway is looking shabby.  The suburban counties keep playing games and nobody wants to get serious.  If it costs money, people make excuses.  But if it's "free", politicians jump all over it.  The interestates were "free", esp in Cincinnati where the subway and canal ROW's served as so much of the 10% local match.  Meanwhile even LA subway, with the benefit of being entirely within LA county, has been stymied by the outrageous tunneling ban spurred by methane fears.  It might have been lifted recently, I don't keep up on it too closely.         

Seattle

 

 

Minneapolis

 

Charlotte

http://youtube.com/watch?v=nuLIgDUk6FQ

 

Cincinnati

http://youtube.com/watch?v=ZsThRfhsICU&feature=related

 

 

sorry...I HAD to post this...please direct all hate mail and anger towards me...  8-)

anyone heard of any news about another subway tour?

I've heard that the tours weren't all that good.  Apparently you aren't supposed to take pictures while on the tour, and it is quite expensive.  I also heard that you can't see all that much.  Just some food for thought.

^ I went this year and i have to say that i completely disagree.  If there is anything that i didnt like it was the cost.  But i took the position that my 50 dollars was going to fund a great program that provides fantastic opportunities for the general public to experience parts of our city's history that other wise wouldnt be accessible. 

 

They said that you werent allowed to take pictures but my buddy brought a camera anyway.  When we asked one of the chaperons below if we could take pictures, he looked at us as if we were crazy, then continued to say "take all the pictures you can".  Unfortunately its just too dark and the spaces too vast for any photos to come out well without substantial supplemental lighting. 

 

You cant see much because frankly there isn't much to see.  After all its an empty concrete tube.  The guides took us close to a quarter mile down the tunnel...significantly further than i assumed they would be allowed to take us.  To be walking the tunnels and the abandoned platforms sent shivers down my spine.  At any moment i fully expected a train to go blazing by. 

 

You have to truly appreciate the subway for what it is and what it could have been to really appreciate the tour.  Obviously not everybody can have that appreciation so perhaps that wasnt the case with whomever you hear that the tours werent all that good.

 

I thought the opportunity to explore one of the city's greatest secretes was quite simply amazing and i suggest to anybody that might be interested to give it a shot. 

I got in there on a tour for free, with some county engineers, if I recall correctly. We could take pictures and they had lots of lights down there.

The subways are really pretty boring. When we could trespass easily, it was great but the whole mystique is lost when you are given a tour and aren't allowed to take photographs. Screw that.

I went this year, and I thought it was pretty cool.  Not a lot of people know that Cincinnati even attempted a subway system  So in addition to the tour you are using this opportunity to educate people about their hometown history.  While the subway system was a failed attempt, it does instigate conversation about the Streetcar Proposal. 

 

It was rather dark and damp down there, so if you get squimish in that atmosphere, I wouldn't recommend it.  Plus, our tour was right after a heavy rain so there were lots of puddles you had to walk through. 

 

You know that scene in Ghostbusters II where they are down in the old subway system...that is what it is like.  Minus the ghost train of course.

If there's some really old graffiti in there, I'd be really interested in seeing it.

 

I thought the Hopple St. portion was pretty cool when I went. Of course my scared friends made me walk in there first, ahead of them and it was midnight and all we had were little flashlights we got from the shell station nearby. Typical.

There really isn't any old graffiti, at least from what I've seen.  Well, you already know that from the Hopple Street portion.  It's just a bunch of rebellious ratfinks these days who want to cure boredom for a few minutes.